Absinth to Sip

Absinth....or Absinthe is a most unusual drink according to Wikipedia. This ornament was created in Germany by Inge-Glas. It is made of mouth blown, hand painted glass and will be arriving in a few weeks to Trendy Tree. I didn't know what the drink was actually so I did a little reading and was quite surprised at it's history. Traditionally, absinthe is prepared by placing a sugar cube on top of a specially designed slotted spoon and then placing the spoon on the glass which has been filled with a shot of absinthe. Ice-cold water is then poured or dripped over the sugar cube so that the water is slowly and evenly displaced into the absinthe, typically 1 part absinthe and 3 to 5 parts water. During this process, components not soluble in water (mainly those from anise, fennel, and star anise) come out of solution and cloud the drink. The resulting milky opalescence is called the louche (Fr. "opaque" or "shady", IPA ). Releasing these components allows herbal aromas and flavours to "blossom" or "bloom" and brings out subtleties originally over-powered by the anise. This is often referred to as "The French Method." (Wikipedia) Sounds too difficult and time consuming to me....but I'm not a fan of liquors....so I'm not a good judge. Apparently there was quite a lot of misinformation out there about Absinth being hallucinogenic....and having an ingredient found in cannabis....this eventually was proven wrong but there are a lot of writings from literature greats that give typical hallucinogenic descriptions with its use. It was actually banned from the United States. That ban was lifted in 2007 after clarification of the business with the cannabis ingredient was cleared up. To read more detail, visit Wikipedia.